Letters to the Editor - 12/11/2007

Hooray! It's a nice step forward. The state of California
passed, and the governor signed, SB 777, the Student Civil Rights
Act. It was already illegal for school administrators and teachers
to allow harassment and bullying of kids based on their
nationality, color, religion, gender or disability. The new law
extends similar protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual or
transgender children. Actually, some individual school districts
had already added these protections on their own.

Harassment of LGBT students in public schools is still a
nationwide problem, with sometimes permanently harmful effects on
young people. Yet, as I write this, there is an effort to launch a
referendum to overturn SB 777. Unbelievable! Don't we want to
protect all our children?

Sadly, part of the motivation to deny such protection is based
on some people's religious beliefs. Such opponents seek to paint
horrific pictures of what will now occur in schools, no matter how
unlikely or ridiculous. Their basis seems to be the usual
superstition, ignorance and fear. Remember, someone you know and
love may be LGBT.

Rocky Velgos

Vista

Don't let global warming hoopla destroy
lifestyle

I have been researching the subject of carbon dioxide as the
major cause of global warming. I don't know if there really is
global warming, but I really don't believe that man-made CO2 is a
major, or even a minor cause.

The fact is, there are about 300 parts per million in our
atmosphere at sea level and there are several other gases in our
atmosphere that convert sunlight to heat as efficiently as CO2.
Their quantities are also much greater than CO2. Volcanoes belch
thousands of tons of many gases such as CO2, CO, SO2, methane,
water vapor and ash into the atmosphere each day. At any moment
there are perhaps eight or 10 volcanoes erupting on the planet.

In January, 29 volcanoes erupted. St. Helens erupted recently
dumping 16,000 tons of smoke and ash into the air. … What about the
smoke from our fires and 8 million acres of U.S. forest fires so
far this year? I have also learned that pine trees expel lots of
carbon and hydrogen.

So let's not let the political and media hoopla get us any more
excited and worried about man-made carbon pollution and destroy our
economy and lifestyle.

Trent Hamlin

Vista

The threat of tolerance

Readers of this newspaper are fortunate to have a columnist like
Sunana Batra warn us of the threat to the "very foundations of our
civilization" posed by homosexuals and their "agenda" for civil
rights
("New law tests the limits of tolerance
," Opinion, Dec. 6).
This includes the threat of Senate Bill 777, which would, in part,
prevent students from proselytizing in the schools against
homosexuality.

Parents can stop worrying about the loss of their homes from
ballooning interest rates and the decrease of the real income of
the middle class. They no longer need fear bankruptcy caused by
catastrophic illness, even to those with medical insurance. The
real threat to the family isn't the collapse of the U.S. dollar,
and it isn't even the monstrous federal deficit financed in large
part by the atheistic communist country of China. And it's not
important that this debt will be passed on to their children and
even their grandchildren.